Hosts Pakistan Punish Malaysia In World Team Championships

Hosts Pakistan ended their qualifying campaign in the Big Time World Team Championships in Islamabad by beating sixth seeds Malaysia 3/0 in today's final tie in Pool F to finish ahead of their higher-seeded Asian rivals.

After Safeer Ullah Khan put the seventh seeds ahead when he beat recently-crowned South East Asian Games champion Mohd Nafiizwan Adnan 9-3 9-7 9-0, his Pakistan team-mate Mansoor Zaman, ranked 27 in the world, clinched victory for the hosts by fighting back from 2/1 down to overcome Ong Beng Hee, ranked 11 places higher, 9-6 0-9 9-10 9-8 9-3.

India justified their tenth seeding by overcoming Ireland 2/1 to finish in second place behind France in Pool C, thereby qualifying for a place in the knockout stages for the top 12 nations.

Favourites England swept to their third successive 3/0 win in the tournament with a comprehensive victory over Austria. Former world No1 Peter Nicol, playing for the first time as third string for his country, put the top seeds ahead with a 9-1 9-1 9-2 win over Austrian newcomer Stefan Brauneis.

Team-mate James Willstrop, the new world No2 and England No1, conceded just a single point as he destroyed Aqeel Rehman to ensure England's anticipated status as winners of Pool A.

Defending champions Australia and former champions Egypt joined fellow top four seeds France and England with further 3/0 wins today - Australia beating Netherlands to head Pool D, and Egypt crushing New Zealand to finish at the top of Pool B. All four nations receive byes in the next knockout stage of the competition.

Germany became the only surprise team to claim a place in the knockout stage to win a top 12 place. After upsetting New Zealand in the first qualifying round, Germany clinched their place in the elite group by beating Iran 3/0.

Play-off places for 1-12 positions:
[1] ENGLAND bye
[8] WALES v [13/18] GERMANY
[4] AUSTRALIA bye
[5] CANADA v [10] INDIA
[7] PAKISTAN v [9] NETHERLANDS
[3] FRANCE bye
[6] MALAYSIA v [12] SOUTH AFRICA
[2] EGYPT bye

Final qualifying round - Pool A:
[12] SOUTH AFRICA bt [13/18] KUWAIT 2-1 (Rowan Smith lost to Nasser Al Ramezi 6-9, 2-9, 4-9; Rodney Durbach bt Abdullah Almezayen 9-6, 9-5, 9-4; Michael Tootill bt Bader Al Hussaini 6-9, 9-6, 6-9, 9-4, 9-3)
[1] ENGLAND bt [19/22] AUSTRIA 3-0 (Peter Nicol bt Stefan Brauneis 9-1, 9-1, 9-2; James Willstrop bt Aqeel Rehman 9-1, 9-0, 9-0; Lee Beachill bt Jakob Dirnberger 9-4, 9-2, 9-4)
Final positions: 1 England, 2 South Africa, 3 Kuwait, 4 Austria
Pool B:
[2] EGYPT bt [11] NEW ZEALAND 3-0 (Wael El Hindi bt Martin Knight 9-2, 9-2, 9-1; Amr Shabana bt Kashif Shuja 9-4, 9-0, 9-0; Karim Darwish bt Callum O'Brien 9-1, 9-0, 9-0)
[13/18] GERMANY bt [19/22] IRAN 3-0 (Patrick Gaessler bt Mohamad Hassan Jafari 9-3, 9-3, 9-0; Stefan Leifels bt Majid Rohani 9-2, 9-4, 9-3; Simon Baker bt Poya Ahmad Abadi 9-2, 9-3, 9-5)
Final positions: 1 Egypt, 2 Germany, 3 New Zealand, 4 Iran
Pool C:
[10] INDIA bt [13/18] IRELAND 2-1 (Siddharth Suchde bt Brian Byrne 9-5, 9-1, 9-2; Ritwik Bhattacharya lost to Liam Kenny 7-9, 3-9, 6-9; Saurav Ghosal bt Arthur Gaskin 6-9, 9-5, 9-0, 9-1)
Final positions: 1 France, 2 India, 3 Ireland
Pool D:
[4] AUSTRALIA bt [9] NETHERLANDS 3-0 (Joseph Kneipp bt Marc Reus 9-0, 9-1, 9-2; Anthony Ricketts bt Laurens Jan Anjema 9-3, 9-3, 9-1; Stewart Boswell bt Tom Hoevenaars 9-0, 9-0, 9-0)
[13/18] FINLAND bt [19/22] USA 2-1 (Hameed Ahmed bt Beau River 0-9, 9-7, 9-5, 9-1; Olli Tuominen bt Preston Quick 9-7, 9-0, 9-1; Matias Tuomi lost to Julian Illingworth 10-8, 9-2, 5-9, 0-9, 2-9)
Final positions: 1 Australia, 2 Netherlands, 3 Finland, 4 USA
Pool E:
[8] WALES bt [13/18] HONG KONG 3-0 (Gavin Jones bt Anson Kwong 9-2, 9-1, 9-2; Alex Gough bt Wai Hang Wong 1-9, 9-2, 9-3, 9-4; David Evans bt Dick Lau 9-3, 9-2, 9-1)
Final positions: 1 Canada, 2 Wales, 3 Hong Kong
Pool F:
[7] PAKISTAN bt [6] MALAYSIA 3-0 (Safeer Ullah Khan bt Mohd Nafiizwan Adnan 9-3, 9-7, 9-0; Mansoor Zaman bt Ong Beng Hee 9-6, 0-9, 9-10, 9-8, 9-3; Farhan Mehboob bt Timothy Arnold 9-4, 9-3, 9-1)
[13/18] SCOTLAND bt [19/22] SPAIN 3-0 (Stuart Crawford bt Alejandro Garbi Caro 1-9, 9-2, 9-2, 9-2; John White bt Iago Cornes 9-2, 9-5, 9-3; Harry Leitch bt David Vidal Villamide 9-7, 9-4, 10-9)
Final positions: 1 Pakistan, 2 Malaysia, 3 Scotland, 4 Spain